waileong said:Try shooting on a better day. Light is very bad.
Overcast days are actually best for portraits, the lighting is even, no shadows, no eyebags, etc... Instead of telling the model to pose & pose & pose, talk to her, let her feel at ease. Try shooting something more natural then just pose shots.erizai said:Yup, the weather really bad that day. will try to learn.. not good in controling background..
paying too much attention on the character's expression.. these is the best that day I can perform.. the rest are even worst.. hope will improve..:sweat:
student said:If these are newbies shots, you have done quite well.
There are of course no perfect images, only images that "work".
My specific comments, some contrary to the other comments expressed, are
1 These are "environmental portraits". And as environmental portraits, "backgrounds" are inherent. These images showed this lovely young lady in various locations in Singapore. I have no problem with the choice of backgrounds. There is nothing inherently wrong with them. Only a matter of prefrence.
2 This kind of weather (cloudy, overcast) is actually best for flattering portraits. The light is soft and moulds facial features well.
3 You do not "control" light and background in environmental portraits. You accept what is available and use them to the best advantage.
4 Background CAN be more prominent than the person. It depends on what you are trying to portray. Do not be trapped into a cliche mentality.
5 I have never been interested in "Posing". I clicked when I like what I saw. Read what Xing said.
6 Contrary to what was mentioned, these images showed something about this young lady. Pleasant, sweet. Refreshingly "innocent". A lot have been mentioned about capturing the "personality" of the model. This is a notion that have been repeated ad nauseum. Fact is, how much do you really know yourself? Most of us have multifaceted personality. Which "personality" are you trying to "capture"? Photography is telling a story about the person (here in portraiture) as YOU see it. Not the "personality" of the person. It is about telling a story of the person.
On the negative side, I will mention what I feel to be the main problem.
The problem is underexposure. It is not the weather. It is inadequate exposure. Of course, "posing", "framing" etc etc can always be improved. But first get the exposure right.
If you do not mind, I will take your images and tweak them a little.
solarii said:Haha lots of mixed opinions.
For me I realised that 90% of people have no idea how to pose, and tend to get "lost" when you tell them "its ok, be yourself. Adopt any natural stance". Further more, everyone is flawed. Some have big noses, double chins, long necks, short necks, unequal sized eyes etc.
During portraiture, people want to look their BEST. Showing them a picture where one eye is bigger then the other and telling them "thats you -accept it" isn't very professional. Thats where we come in. Most people are unaware of how they can de-emphasize their flaws. With a little direction, we can help them make their flaws less prominent. In other words, we have to show them poses which flatter them rather than exaggerate their flaws. People I've worked with are generally aware of their short comings and do NOT want it to be reflected in their photos. Some have gone as far as asking me to photoshop the images to make them look slimmer. Bottom line, people want to look good, though not to the point of being artificial. They don't really care how you do it.
And lighting for subject and background are two seperate issues. Lighting for subject can be "controlled" in the sense that you can work around what nature provides by adding your own reflectors, flashes etc. Depends on how involved you want to get. You don't have to accept the lighting as it is (I'm talking about lighting for the subject) . Its true that you can't change the background much, but why would you want to? Its chosen for a specific reason.
solarii said:A very enlightening post... I see what you're getting at, and I commend your efforts to be creative and not be restricted by the cliched view of portraits. Its true that after a while portraits, especially those glossies in fashion mags tend to get repetitive and stale. Haha sadly most people don't see it your way. They usually want to "look like that model in the picture".
Ultimately I guess its up to erizai to decide what kind of portraits he/his subjects want. Does he want to create his own style, or emulate the universally accepted standards for portraiture.
student said:I understand what you are saying.
.... In fact Deadpoet once mentioned that a portraiture has to have the approval of the model.
What you and Deadpoet and everybody else are doing is towards a single objective - Make the person/model look good. Which is fine if that is what you want. As you said " People want to look their Best" ...
erizai said:I'm using jpeg fine to shoot.
If I use raw, do you guys think that that can salvage my image or by somehow a level that can further improve my image?
I don't have Nikon Capture, that is why i use jpeg fine. I had seen a new software that come out from apple -- aperture, that also serve as a raw file editor which has very good features. (but require very high system requiremnt-- at least a Mac of single G51.8/1gbam/10.4.3/Ati9600 pro or equal..)
May be I should explore more on the post-processing side...
solarii said:Haha I wouldn't rely too much on post-processing to salvage images. Its time consuming, and you should try to get better shots straight out of the camera. Most newbies make the mistake of thinking that they can correct mistakes later, and hence tend to be more slack in the actual shoot. There's a limit to how much post-processing can help.
Train yourself to be more critical at the shoot. Look out for distracting elements, think about the lighting, composition. Stop for a moment to consider if there's anything that can be done better. To improve your photography, spend more time behind the camera than behind the keyboard.
To share some personal experience, when I was using a p&s camera I wasn't satisfied with the results and spent hours touching up with PS till I got pretty good at it. Results were as good as any dSLR provided you don't magnify the images. But I got sick and tired of PS after a while, so I splurged on an SLR to get better results straight out. Haven't regretted the decision and I spend more time shooting and much less time on PS.